A Marathon Search For The Perfect Race Ends Among Ancient Redwoods

For a long time now—ever since distance running came into high fashion—I've been searching for the perfect run. I've entered events (and have several drawersful of T shirts to prove it) ranging in length from 5 km (too short for a middle-aged man) to 100 miles (too long for this middle-aged man); from New York (too crowded) to Honolulu (too hot), from mountain trails (steep and rough, but otherwise pleasant) to flat pavement (fast but boring); from those with 10 or a dozen entrants (so small that you usually end up running all alone) to those with 10,000 (fine if you need practice at weaving your way through a rush-hour mob to catch a bus or subway train).

I can finally report that the Avenue of the Giants Marathon, organized by the Six Rivers Running Club of Arcata and held for the past 12 years on the first Sunday in May in Northern California's Humboldt County, is as nearly perfect as any one of my tastes is likely to get. The course, following the Eel River and its Bull Creek tributary, runs over gently rolling hills and through groves of coastal redwoods. The cool, damp weather that has sustained the redwoods for millennia is ideal for runners, and because of the limitations of the course and of nearby lodging, the field is limited to 2,000—a size that makes for plenty of company (I like to eavesdrop) but not for crowds.

I had heard of "the Ave," as it's affectionately called by those who know it, from runners at races up and down the West Coast, and last year I decided it was finally time to try it. So, a minute or two before 9 a.m. on May 1, my 20-year-old son, Pete, and I shook hands and wished each other luck, then walked into the mass of nervous, stretching, hopping, shuffling runners massed at the starting line on a paved, two-lane road.

Pete had decided to drive down from Oregon with me only a couple of weeks earlier, when an injured entrant from our area offered him his number. He lined up with the six-minutes-per-mile runners. I had entered in February, but, as usual, my training had been barely adequate, so I joined the seven-minute milers. "Perfect day," a wiry little man beside me said, and then, before I had time to respond, up ahead the gun went off.

My interest in redwood trees was aroused when, as a 12-year-old in Hawaii in 1949, I learned to surf on redwood boards—planks, we called them. Because of my love for those boards I began to read everything I could find about the trees they came from. Now, striding easily through the first mile, other runners padding along, their footfalls strangely silent within the walls and canopy of huge, red-barked, fire-scarred, laceleafed trees, I recalled much of what I had read as a boy.

The first positively identified redwood fossils date back almost 130 million years, so these trees were a living link to a time before the continents were formed, when flying reptiles circled overhead and dinosaurs ruled the land. In that day redwoods grew over much of the earth, but because of altering climatic conditions they have been slowly, inexorably reduced to a 10,000-square-mile strip (much of it protected parkland), the heart of which is in the usually foggy valleys of Northern California. The oldest coastal redwoods are more than 2,000 years old, and one large tree contains enough strong, lightweight, straight-grained, fire-and insect-resistant lumber to build a community of 25 or 30 good-sized houses. Such a tree is as high as a football field is long and nearly 60 feet in circumference—in other words two first downs, or eight Kareem Abdul-Jabbars, or approximately the distance from the pitcher's mound to home. But, as Dr. Paul Zinke of the University of California once remarked in regard to redwoods, "With trees, as with women, too much emphasis can be placed on measurements."

I coasted along, enjoying the dark, cool shade and the massive trunks along both sides of the road. Instead of discussing their pace or the times they were aiming for, which is what you generally hear at the beginning of a race, runners around me were talking about the course.

"No traffic sure makes it nice, doesn't it," said one.

"Great," another answered.

"Look at that one."